


Archipelago

by Prawnperson



Category: Don't Starve (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Grue WX-78, Pining, Triumphant Walani, Triumphant Walani!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-26
Updated: 2019-09-26
Packaged: 2020-10-28 21:48:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20785562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prawnperson/pseuds/Prawnperson
Summary: In which multiple people can be in adventure mode at once, friendships are forged, and hearts are broken.





	Archipelago

The walls of their base are bulky. Triple stacked and pressed snugly together. The way in and out is difficult to find. It’s hidden, placed to the very edge of the island that faces the sea, forcing whoever wants to enter to skirt around the edge lest they fall into the murky depths. 

Her walls are smooth, like alabaster. The outer layer is the same silky stone, and inside is layers upon layers of dry, bundled grass. Her walls may be weaker, but they’re higher. They wrap around her base like an all encompassing embrace.

They have everything set up in a neat formation. Chests. Bedroll. Crockpot. Science machine. All kept in their exact, meticulous position.

She has a large tent in the centre of the circle of light green meadow grass that makes up her interior. Around it are placed her essentials, her precious surfboard hoarded within the tent like a precious gem.

All around their island, they have traps. The entire outer edge, save for the narrow path to the entrance, is covered in harsh spikes. Splinters of wood designed to snag up any floating debris on the water and deter any creatures from the depths attempting to climb up. They’ve seen it happen. They don’t want to take any risks. The spaces that aren’t covered in such spines are either concealed bird traps or bee boxes, often times filled with sticky honey. The temptation proves to be too much for some animals, and soon, there is a small corpse on the ground, littered with sting marks.

Her patch of land has flowers and crops. They are all lazily planted, with no exact rhyme or reason. There is no definite way of telling what exactly is growing where, no certainty. She has a stash of treasures that she uses for nothing, simply there for the purposes of admiration. There’s gold, gemstones, pieces of the machine she’s actually putting effort into finding, weapons. All kinds of things, one of the few parts of the island she believes the effort was worth.

Whenever darkness falls, they come together. Two lone creatures in the darkness. Walani doesn’t know what she seeks. Neither does WX-78. They are both content to fulfil the curious urge with contact. Conversations that never lead to the conclusions they should, touches that are so fleeting they’re barely there. The ache of extended separation is almost unbearable, so they simply choose not to bare it.

Walani surfs over to them more often than not. They know how foolish it is to let her learn where their traps are, let her find their soft underbelly, the one they have worked so hard to hide, but they need her to stay with them.

Promises that they have every intention of keeping are broken with her death. She goes so quickly. Fleetingly. They often find her on the centre most island. The one that juts out for just a little longer. She’ll usually be lying in a pool of her own blood, sickly and pale looking, fingers curled delicately in and eyes shut as though she’s asleep. They take her body, and place it in the water. It always sinks like a stone, much faster than it would in the real world. 

She always comes back with no memory of them.

It’s painful. Painful to watch her build up her camp with such sweet optimism, such care, such dedication despite her self confessed laziness. It hurts to have her curiously ask their name, and it hurts for them to have their meeting seem accidental every time, like they don’t know who she is. Like they don’t think about her all the time.

The one time they do attempt to tell her who she is, who they are, what they’ve done, she leaves. Looks at them with wide, terrified eyes and shoves them away and takes her belongings to the island farthest away from theirs. They check the wormhole that leads to it. It’s full of rocks, preventing them from even trying to see her.

The few times they’ve died, they’ve always come back with their memories intact. They don’t know why she returns without any prior knowledge of this place. They don’t know. 

One time, she goes away and doesn’t come back. WX-78 decides to move on. There is nothing left for them to wait for. The pieces of the machine click together as they enter the next world, and they repeat this process over and over again until they have nowhere else to go.

The tall, frail man who greeted them at first is nowhere to be found. WX-78 is fine with this. They don't pay much mind to his absence beyond a mild curiosity. Besides, the business of keeping alive through freezing cold and pitch darkness and everything in between keeps them preoccupied.

The marble floors of the dark room make their footsteps echo, make them sound as foreboding as they’ve always desired and yet, they don’t like it. It’s too still, too eerie. This is the final destination, they're sure of it, not even a firefly in sight as they trek down the seemingly endless halls. They eventually reach carpet, and, when they do, two large, black stands illuminate a short distance in front of them with an aquamarine glow.

The shine bounces off the polished floor, more lights flickering on as they follow the carpet in its straight path. They’re starting to grow tired, their eyelids inexplicably heavy as they traipse for what seems like hours upon hours of stagnant corridor.

They finally reach a larger square of carpet, tired eyes trailing up towards the base of a stage, upon which sits a throne, dark as night and sharp as a sword. It’s walled off in a semicircle by large piles, made of the same slithering, dark material. Sprouting up from the cracks in the marble are richly coloured flowers, all layered with thorns and threateningly dull palettes.

“You came...”

Her voice is much softer than usual. Much colder. They gaze at her, can’t find it in themselves to look away. She’s adorned in black all over, dark robes that only serve to make her seem taller and sharper. 

“I remember you now.”

She coos. 

They glance around the room farther, soaking in the sight and her affectionate gaze like a sponge. The only problem is that her eyes betray her malice, the dark energy thrumming within her core as she sits upon the throne. The gramophone at her side plays something soft and idling, the music mingling with the sounds of the ocean that echo from somewhere within the cavernous hall.

“Your tolerance of me won’t go unnoticed.”

They feel themselves fall to their knees without their say so, systems weakening in her mere presence for some terrifying reason they cannot comprehend. She tilts their chin up with her claw tipped fingers. They can feel a chill akin to that of the winter worlds from before run through their circuits at her touch.

“Nor will your other affections. Those that I have now been made aware of.”

Her tone is overly formal, not at all like the calm, relaxed Walani they remember. The fingers curled below their jaw are making them feel dizzy and heavy, cold all over. They feel like they could fall down and sleep at her feet, curled up like a cat by a fireplace in this endless abyss of marble and darkness.

Whenever she smiles, they can see her teeth are sharp as needles.

“I have won the game, and you have come as runner up.”

Darkness.

Whenever they wake up, they feel strange, like they’re too heavy and too light at the same time. Their thought are jumbled, locked behind a hazy fog. The only thing clear in their mind is the desire to seek. Seek someone. Someone alive, and breathing. Someone with light.

They need to extinguish that light. Need to find some way to rid the world of all light, and of water, too, until the entire Constant is nothing but dirt and darkness. She laughs behind them, low and menacing, and they turn to her.

They go to speak, and find their voice is nothing but the hauntingly sweet melody of a music box.


End file.
